Topsy: Instagram Shares Easily Beat Vine On Twitter, Unless You’re Talking About “Influencers”

Instagram has regained supremacy over Vine on Twitter, thanks to its new video feature? That seemed to be the story, based on stats from Topsy. But now, Topsy has clarified there’s a different story, one where Instagram shares on Twitter have never dipped below Vine, at least when you’re looking at all activity rather than just “influencer” activity.

Vine Beat Instagram?

We probably helped kick off the whole “Is Vine bigger than Instagram?” news cycle three weeks ago, when we reported that there was more sharing of Vine on Twitter than Instagram. Here’s the chart we showed then:

That chart came from Topsy, where you can check against data it receives from its partnership with Twitter to discover how many tweets contain certain things, such as links to particular domains. That chart shows that on June 7, tweets with Vine (vine.co) links edged passed those with Instagram (Instagram.com) links.

So was Vine turning into the hot new toy for the Twitter crowd that formerly seemed to love Instagram? Possibly. But the following week, Instagram gained Instagram Video. Curious how that might have changed activity on Twitter, we checked the Topsy stats again yesterday, a full week after Instagram Video was out.

Instagram Back On Top, Thanks To Video?

Our story yesterday reported what we found, that suddenly Vine activity dropped dramatically, after having stayed above Instagram since June 7:

So was Vine no longer hot, now that Instagram had video? Perhaps, though as our story noted, Instagram hadn’t spiked super-high. It had a relatively mild increase.

Still, it sure looked like Vine was somehow negatively impacted by Instagram, so the story got hot again. Hot enough, apparently, for Topsy to decide it needed to weigh in.

Topsy: Outside Of Influencers, Instagram Has Always Been Tops

From its blog post today, Topsy reminds that its free analytics service that anyone can use only pulls activity from a sample of tweets and, importantly, a sample of “the most important people and tweets.”

In contrast, its Topsy Pro service lets you query to find trends against all the tweets it has, “both influential and less so.” When you look at everything, Instagram activity on Twitter is currently about 2.5 times that of Vine, judging from a chart Topsy released with its post:

The chart also shows that Vine had been climbing until about the middle of June, when it began dropping down in activity. It’s hard to tell if that drop came exactly when Instagram gained video or not, but it does look fairly close.

In summary, Vine “beating” Instagram two weeks ago on Twitter seems to be the result of heavy influencer activity. While it was hot with influencers, the full data shows that Instagram has never had a serious dip. In contrast, the full data does suggest that maybe Instagram Video has at least grabbed some of the “video & tweet” activity that Vine had.

Will that trend keep up? “Only time will tell,” Topsy writes.

About The Author

Danny Sullivan

Danny Sullivan was a journalist and analyst who covered the digital and search marketing space from 1996 through 2017. He was also a cofounder of Third Door Media, which publishes Search Engine Land, Marketing Land, MarTech Today and produces the SMX: Search Marketing Expo and MarTech events. He retired from journalism and Third Door Media in June 2017. You can learn more about him on his personal site & blog He can also be found on Facebook and Twitter.